Rotary screen printing presses utilizing a rotary screen unit have heretofore been known as high-speed printing apparatuses for printing objects made from a wide range of materials such as cloth and paper. The rotary screen printing presses employ a printing method involving pushing ink with a squeegee through through-holes formed in the stencil of a screen plate formed in a cylindrical shape to transfer the forced ink onto a printing object.
In general, in such a rotary screen printing press, the squeegee includes a squeegee body (blade) configured to pushing ink, and a support (squeegee bar) supporting the blade. To mount the squeegee on the rotary screen printing press, the squeegee is positioned inside a rotary screen, and opposite end portions of the squeegee bar are fixed to squeegee supporting means. Note that the rotary screen refers to a screen plate formed in a cylindrical shape and having end rings attached to the opposite ends thereof as supporting members.
There had been known a structure in which a conventional rotary screen printing press as described above includes screen-plate supporting means for supporting a rotary screen in such a way that the rotary screen can be engaged with and disengaged from an impression cylinder, and squeegee supporting means supporting the opposite ends of a squeegee bar in such a way that a blade can be engaged with and disengaged from the inner peripheral surface of the rotary screen (see Patent Literature 1, for example).